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It was also the first time I’d touched Winnie Winslow, her small hand tight in mine and her heart in her eyes. God, keeping my eyes off of her and on the wedding had been…challenging. Just short of impossible, really.
“You’re late, but least you’re here,” Tommy teased. “Thatch is a beast, but Kline’s skills are fading now that he’s blissfully chained.”
“Your skin looks fabulous,” Jensen mocked, and I cranked my middle finger up like a jack-in-the-box at the same time Kline reacted to his own dig.
“Fuck you,” Kline said playfully, no sting in his tone and a grin lifting the corners of his mouth. He was never one to get upset, and now that Georgia occupied his bed morning and night, he was practically unflappable.
The bastard.
“Hey, I’m married too,” Thatch protested irrationally, practically begging the guys to razz on him about being tied to Crazy Cassie. He fed on the energy, built on it until the only one left floundering was the person who’d set him up. Unfortunately for me and entertainment value, Thatch was too big and the guys were too smart to say anything really biting.
“Congratulations,” Sawyer offered as Johnny plucked out, “Poor woman.”
Thatch was speechless, wanting them to poke at him so he could shove back, but at a current loss as to how to make that happen.
“It’s okay, big guy,” I teased, slapping him on the back roughly. “I’m sure Cassie will torture you for your newfound status enough for the rest of us.”
“Cassie isn’t torture.”
Subtle smiles were exchanged before everyone started to back away. The bomb was primed, the gun was loaded, and the whole damn place was just ticking away on its little timer.
If we let it, our entire practice could easily be spent here, shooting the shit and razzing the fuck out of whatever wounded animal found its way into the circle. It was the nature of men. Torment or be tormented. One or the other.
I raised my brows as the other guys dispersed, and Kline jogged over to his bag to look at his phone one more time. Jensen called out from the pitch about how good Georgia must have looked when she sexted. Kline threw up a middle finger over his shoulder and kept his head to his phone.
“Okay, but it’s the good kind,” Thatch admitted, bringing my attention back to him. “Like a little spank with a riding crop or a flogger.”
I smiled at the memory of slapping Winnie’s pussy and ass and the fucking delightful way she reacted to both.
Thatch didn’t know how to interpret it, and unknowingly granted me an innocence of which I wasn’t even remotely worthy. “Are your ears burning? Was that too scary for you?”
I just laughed and turned away, taking my position and stretching my hamstrings as the scrimmage got underway. He has no fucking clue.
A lot of guys shared all the stories of their sexcapades, but I’d never been one to give more than a couple cursory details—and it’d never been like it was with Winnie. So he really didn’t have any idea. About my proclivity or past or present.
Even the things he thought he knew were just that—thoughts.
Part of that was because even I didn’t have any hard and fast rules or expectations—I liked what I liked in the moment and went with whatever made my companion the wettest. The difference now was that what got Winnie drenched, concurrently got me hard—like two halves of a sexually deviant whole, everything that made her tick made me tock, and when I came the hardest I’d ever come, she came harder.
We were a match in a way I hadn’t been expecting.
And, evidently, unforeseen circumstances were the theme of the day. Like a goddamn iron fist, with speed and an arch created by a powerful kick by Tommy, the ball hit me right square in the nuts.
Pain erupted like a million firecrackers exploding in my pants, and I closed my eyes against the onslaught.
Thatch yelled, “Oh, shit!” from across the pitch, but the tremor of laughter in his voice made me take out a mental sticky note and write an IOU in the junk-punch department.
“Okay,” I breathed out as I crumpled, hands to junk and knees buckling before the stabbing knife of pain consumed me to the point that I couldn’t fake it anymore. “Fuck.” I huffed as I dropped my knees and forehead to the ground and prayed to the Goddess of Mercy to grant me some.
I guess I won’t be using my nuts within the next twenty-four hours, I thought sardonically. Distracted by Winnie, not paying any attention to the game, I’d been thinking with nothing but my dick, and now he was going to pay the goddamn price.
My mental pen and paper were busy as I wrote another note to ask Winnie if she’d be willing to kiss it better—and then added an addendum to make sure I could get it up first, in a jerk-off session test, to make sure I didn’t goddamn embarrass myself.
“Come on, man,” Kline called from above me. His voice was reassuring but fucking annoying all the same. “Get up.”
“You get up, cocksucker,” I insulted him nonsensically.
“What?” Thatch asked. “You pussying out? One little tap to the junk and you’re done for the day?”
“Go fuck yourself,” I told him around a moan as I writhed on the ground like a fucking child with appendicitis. “I’m a grown man with nothing to prove. I’m not looking to out-fucking-rugby anybody, so today, yes, I’m done.” I’d already burned all the calories necessary for the day in much more pleasurable activities.
Thatch laughed and turned to the team waiting on the field. “Whitney’s got her period. Time to call it, boys.”
I heard a few groans, a couple of jabs, but mostly, everyone seemed thankful. None of us were striving for the Olympics at this point, and we’d all been at work all day. There were drinks and sex to be had, and no one minded when they weren’t the excuse. “Just give me a reason!” their eyes screamed. My battered and bruised nuts answered. Decision—final.
Slowly, I climbed to my feet and walked toward the bleachers gingerly, wincing with each step and thanking Jesus I’d had Winnie so many times today in my office.
Thank fuck she wasn’t willing to take no for an answer.
As the crowd thinned and everyone moved out of earshot, Thatch’s eager bob became a bounce.
“Can I talk now?” Thatch asked Kline like a little boy asking his father for permission.
With an incline of his chin and sweep of his arm, Kline granted it regally.
“You fucked her. More than once.”
I sat silent as they stared at me.
“Well?” Thatch prompted after several seconds of waiting to no avail.
“Well, what?” I asked innocently. “You made a statement. I didn’t hear a question.”
Thatch looked to Kline with a smile, and Kline leaned into the bleachers and settled a hip. “When’s the wedding?”
I shook my head as I pulled myself to standing and made my way toward my bag.
“Silence,” Thatch commentated with a chuckle.
“You know what that means,” Kline continued as I pretended to ignore them both.
But my mind was all too aware of the veracity of their words when Thatch said, “Just like the wickedest of witches, with the right weapon, our own little Wes is melting.”
And that’s actually exactly how it felt—like I was slipping away, fading into a new normal.
How long will it take me to slip past the point of no return? I asked myself. Until there’s no evidence left of all that I am other than the puddle of memories past on the floor?
And will Winnie Winslow be strong enough to save herself?
“What in the hell is this?”
“That’s your Harley Quinn costume, Win.”
“Are you serious?” I asked Cassie as I stared down at the clothes laid out across the bed in her guest room. Though, describing this amount of material as clothes was being pretty fucking generous.
Good God, it’s fabric swatches at best.
I’d hauled ass over to her and Thatch’s apartment after the Mavericks’ practice had ended—three trains and a four-block power walk—just so that I could get ready for the Brooks Media big Halloween bash with her, at her ridiculous pregnant request, and this was the thanks I got?
She grinned and nodded her head. “I’m very serious.”
“Fishnets? Booty shorts?” I muttered mostly to myself. My voice was high-pitched—how it gets when it’s bordering on hysteria. “Will I also be selling blow jobs for twenty dollars?”
She scoffed. “Have some self-respect, Win.”
I started to laugh, but she interrupted. “That price is ridiculously low.”
“Cassie!” I snapped, and she laughed then.
“Haven’t you see Suicide Squad? This is exactly what Harley Quinn wears.” She moved across the room and pulled out two bottles with pink and blue caps. “And don’t worry. I even got temporary hair color! Your hair is going to look fluffing amazing in pigtails!”
“Don’t worry? You’re coloring my hair shades of the rainbow, and my ass cheeks are going to be hanging out all night!”
She winked. “Good thing you’ve got a hot ass. And don’t worry because everyone is going to know exactly who you’re going for. No mistaking you for a call girl. Swear.”
I shook my head as I looked back to the bed and mumbled to myself, “Georgia was right.”
